The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1887-08-13

miieS from nOulb. ihClc was raVlne |
and plenty of brush, and the horses
were ready to drop in their tracks, and
that last ten miles was one of the things
tnat couldn't be done. So we got our
fires made and our horses fed and
sheltered as well as we could, and put
some heart into ourselves with buffalo
steak and hot coffee; and the rest of
them packed themselves into the
wagon. Some one had to stand guard
and keep the fires going, and took
the contract.
1t wasn't dark night There was
goodish bit of moon behind the
clouds, and it made gray kind of
light over every thing. We were at
the bottom of dry canyon that ran
east and west, and the wind did not
reach us. 1t screeched and screamed
over our heads, and through it all
there was a kind of moaning roar, as
if we were at the bottom of a tide as
deep as the stars are high. got to
thinking about old times away back, of
one Sunday night just before we were
married l had gone East little sooner
than we expected and mad to wait for
her things to be finished. We went TO
church that night. A keen, crisp, still
night it was, when the sleigh-runners
squeaked on the snow and the moon
light traced the shadows of the elms on
the white ground as if they had been
put in in black drawing The church
was warm and bright and they hadn't
taken down the Christmas greens yet, so
the airwas full of the smell ofthem--that
spicy, haunting smell, that seems as if
it came somehow from world before
this. 1t was years since | had smelled
it, and | sat and listened to the music
and looked at the people, with their
comfortable clothing and faces that
were cheerful, not worn and wrinkled
with care and weather Molly was an
awfully pretty girl in those days; all
pink and white like an apple blossom,
somehow. And fighting to keep awake
out there in the heart of Kansas prairie
l got to thinking about her as she wa;
then and how she had changed. Skin
the color of tanned leather now, and
that wild, hungry look in her blue eyes
as if they were always staring into the
dark for something that frightened
her. And both her children dead. ant
not even a spray of the pine she loveC
so, nor a breath of music; nothing bu
a dirt floor and log walls that did al
that was expected of them if they KEEP
the weather out.
Somebody hailed over the top of thu
bluff
"What camps that?"
"Kenyon and mates"
II lowed it was'-scrambling dowT
the sides of the gulch on his sure-footeC
mule-"You KenyonP News for you
A kid up to your ranch, ten days old
All hands doing well yesterday morn
ing"
The rest reused themselves, sleepily
He had got off the trail, and seeing on
smoke had struck for it. We, knew
and he knew that the chances wer
that it saved his life; but he swallowed
his coffee and smoked his pipe ant
| turned in with the rest as il gettinI
! lost in a norther was one of tn
| things that happened, of course, t
every man.
l Then | sat and thought while, an
: finally reused out Madison.
t you take my urn" l said to him
. I'm going home"
5 Not brute that will travel"
5 You'll pass in your checks befor
5 morning"
| mo, the wind is at my back n
| fords; I'll keep going" and Iwent
Went; half running, with the win
1 driving me on till 1 was ready to droF
+ Once fell and lay there with the win
! dragging and tearing at me until | be
= gan to grow sleepy, and then had go
5 to get up and go ahead again.
8 Perhaps you never tried crossing
e prairie at night without trail to TO
y low. It's curious thing. one l can
0 account for; one that makes you feel q
Z. if your body and all your senses wer
+ of no more account than a spent cal
t fridge. 1t happened to me that nigh
o space and time seemed to get all mike
e up together all at once racing along;
n seemed to me that l had been keepin
n up that sort of thing for hours. ] fe
4 so adrift somehow-so horribly lost
$ as if / had slipped out of myself an
n was out in space without landmar
# to measure any thing by. l expe'
e you'll have to try it yourself to kno
e what mean. l had no wa cl
/, there was no way of knowing no
g much time had gone. o all the devi
}. that can enter into a man uncertaint
:, IS the worst. Every sort of fame